After many months of tributes to the Queen's duty, virtue, sacrifice, judgment, wit, piety, courage, steadfastness, humour, wisdom, thrift, clothes, superb equestrianism, etc, etc, it fell to Sir Peter Tapsell MP, the Father of the House, to remind everyone of another vital element in the unique royal skill-set. For his generation, he told the Commons last week: "The abiding memory of our Queen is her stunning beauty when she came to the throne." And his point? "There is nothing more inspiriting in the whole world than a beautiful woman."

Though a diamond jubilee is no time for the obvious counter-factual prompted by his tribute – what if the Queen had been homely, ungainly and fat? – Sir Peter usefully reassures today's subjects that to drool over royal and demi-royal hotness is an entirely proper expression of adulation and probably vital to any full consideration of the monarchy.

In the respectful subject, the close examination of Kate's thighs, as revealed in her inspiriting short skirts, may be no more inappropriate than Sir Peter's historic connoisseurship. It was shared, maybe more tastefully, by the photographer Cecil Beaton. "The cheeks are sugar pink," he said of the Queen's appearance at the coronation. "Her hair tightly curled around the Victorian diadem of precious stones straight on her brow… as she walks, she allows her heavy skirt to swing backwards and forwards in a beautiful rhythmic effect. This girlish figure has enormous dignity…"

Seen in this light, popular dedication to the vigour and potential of Kate's sister's bum, often shown to beautiful rhythmic effect, only affirms the continuity between the current jubilee and the years after the coronation when, according to historian Sir Charles Petrie, the Queen "was the subject of adulation unparalleled since the days of Louis XIV".

In fact, the only substantial difference between the jubilee and the post-coronation public mood, characterised by what Ben Pimlott called "a fetishising of anything or anybody royal", would appear to be the determination on the part of the present media to ignore – along with the existence of any single, living republican – the royal family's abundant human embarrassments. Where are Andrew and Edward and Sophie hiding, while Kate's choice of dog and dress sell out? When will we next see Fergie's two colourful princesses, the young Hinge and Bracket? As for Prince Charles, jubilee sightings of the next in line are so rare as to give cause for concern.

In contrast, the sight of his younger son, Harry, gyrating in a variety of tropical-themed costumes has been inspiriting enough to trigger ovulation in young women of all nationalities, along with the media's sudden appreciation that the individual formerly known as the "party prince" possesses, in addition to hotness, all the qualities required to promote British interests in the post-colonial world.

Less fortunate old Etonians, who are routinely resentfully fingered for their jammy domination of everything from acting to politics, can only marvel at a public and media so intent, where princes are concerned, on setting aside the affront to social mobility. Summarising Harry's triumphs for the BBC, in its occasional role as the broadcasting arm of the palace's PR department, Peter Hunt concluded that this OE "injected fresh global interest into an ancient institution that can, at times, seem terribly out of touch".

Leave aside the obvious advantages, for any queen or ancient institution, of remaining precisely that, and this tone of uninhibited celebration – common to virtually all jubilee reports outside the Republic website – would seem to reflect an overwhelming public desire to preserve the institution intact, complete with its land, tax breaks and a procession of dependants whose fabulous greed, indolence and stupidity has been, thanks to our hard-working tabloids, formally documented.

You would not guess from this concern for the royal status quo that less than a year ago answers to a Guardian/ICM poll depicted "a nation made up of moderate monarchists and reluctant republicans", in which more people thought the crown should pass directly to Prince William than to Prince Charles. Among 19- to 24-year-olds, 37% thought Britain would be better off without the monarchy. If that figure is still remotely accurate, the BBC might, as the campaign group Republic has protested, have tried harder to balance its endless hours of jubilee fawning with coverage of those subjects unable to share in Andrew Marr's bliss, in his recent promotional work for the family, on being allowed inside the Queen's old Wendy House.

Could Harry, as intended, awaken their interest? If the Queen's past is any guide, any effect may be temporary. By 1963, the inspiriting one had been booed to her face and mocked on That Was the Week That Was, in a spoof of the BBC's doting coverage of a royal visit to Australia: "And now the Queen, smiling radiantly, is swimming for her life."

Even if the crown can benefit from the arrival of various young hotnesses, with partners chosen on the usual Abercrombie & Fitch fitness principles, they will be hard put generating enough warmth to save the institution from the arrival of the once dashing, now cantankerous Charles, equipped with fountain pen, reams of paper and a passionate belief in his right to inspect and tinker with legislation. Following a freedom of information request, more light should imminently be shed on the way the prince is routinely consulted on any government bills that might affect his interests, such as those of his £700m property empire.

Understandably, at this patriotic time, nobody wants to dwell on Charles's meddling, his temper and the awful prospect of his accession, any more than they want to dredge up those pictures of a sodden Harry, nightclubbing in Croatia, or of Andrew in a break from diplomatic trips – hugging a 17-year-old masseuse in the employ of his friend, a convicted sex offender. As with coverage of Harry's deployment to Afghanistan and of the royal wedding, the arrival of the jubilee has inaugurated another media truce, an orgy of compliments, quipping and of sentences beginning "mindful" – eg: "Mindful of the economic times, William and Kate have decided that servants, rather than costly interior designers, will be invited to strip their new palace of Princess Margaret's regrettably carcinogenic wall coverings."

The Thames flotilla is months away, but so buoyant are media spirits that, already, it is possible to find captions such as the Daily Mail's: "The teal outfit worn by the Duchess of Cambridge today shows her continuing interest in the colour blue." On the other hand, in line with an official request, media speculation about the duchess's fertility is, compared with its historic efforts, staggeringly muted. Given her previous disinclination to work, and the fairly central role of reproduction in a hereditary monarchy, the media's obedience in this matter is something the Leveson inquiry might, at some point, want to take into account. A press that is more greasily deferential to royals now than it was in the 1960s cannot, surely, be as dreadful as everyone says.

There were few sports that Prince Harry didn't try on his tour – after running with Usain Bolt, he took to Rio's beaches for racing and rugby, had a volleyball lesson, played cricket and took part in a charity polo match